Dead Over Heels (10 page)

She was still pondering that when she sloshed back up to the beach. She knelt by the fire, trying not to wince away from it, expertly spitted the fish on a long branch, and planted the branch in the sand, occasionally turning it so the fish cooked evenly.

Con came loping out of the darkness, and already looked much improved. The fresh water, she decided, and now he smelled like coconuts, so his stomach was full. That was good. Of course, just about anything would have been an improvement.

“Any problems? Look who I’m asking!” he cried, answering his own question. “Like there’s anything you can’t handle. You should have the survival show.”

“Mmmm,” she said, turning the fish again.

“God, that smell is driving me
crazy
,” he said, flopping down on the sand. “I—are you okay? Your eyes are all squinty. It’s the fire, isn’t it? It’s bothering you?”

“A little. They aren’t common at the bottom of the sea,” she said, trying another joke.

“Well, ooch over, I’ll cook.”

“Uh—”

“I’m not
that
helpless,” he said, exasperated. He nudged her in the ribs and she obediently moved over a foot. Instantly her eyes felt better. “You think they’re done yet? They’re done, aren’t they?”

“Not quite.”

“I got a dumb question, here.”

“I,” she teased, “am not surprised.”

He smacked her on the thigh and she laughed. “How do you know how to cook on land?”

“We have banquets—great parties and celebrations—on land. And there is much cooked food at these feasts. The prince in particular enjoys cooked food, so we all learn how to make it when we’re still pups.”

“Pups? Baby mermaids?”

“Yes.”

“What’s the prince like?”

“Infatuated,” she said shortly, picking up a stick and drawing her name in her own language, a complicated grouping of loops and swirls incomprehensible to anyone but her own kind.

“Oh, yeah? You jealous?”

She snorted. “Hardly. I have only met him twice. I do not know him well enough to be jealous of his love affairs.”

“Affairs, plural?”

“But because he fell in love with the half-breed—I mean, Fredrika—” She blushed at her rudeness. After all, she had been at the Pelagic, hadn’t she? And Fredrika had handled herself quite well under the circumstances. She had a startling manner about her, a grimness cloaked in sarcasm, but still—she had acquitted herself well at the Pelagic, well enough that—

“Ree? Hello? Come back, Ree.” He was snapping his fingers before her face in an extremely irritating matter. “Fell in love with the gal who basically talked the king into letting you guys come out of the closet,” he prompted. “Read it in
People
.”

“Well. Yes. She has a great deal of influence with the royal family and I—I am not sure that is the best thing for my people. After all, she spent nearly all of her years on land, being raised by your kind. She knows nothing of Undersea Folks. And,” she added in a mutter, “she comes from bad blood.”

“Oh, yeah? What’s that mean? My daddy was a trucker.”

“Her ‘daddy’ was a traitor. But the prince—and the king—turn a blind eye to this, and, as I said, she has great influence with the royal family.”

“Well, it’s a goddamned good thing she does, otherwise I’d be dead of dehydration by now.”

“Now that is a good point,” she said, cheering up. “I never would have dared approach you even six months ago.”

“Months? You have calendars?”

“Don’t be absurd. The fish are done.” She yanked the stick out of the sand, popped a fish off, and tossed it to him. He tore into it, ingesting a good deal of scales along with the cooked meat, but there were no complaints this time. He wolfed down the second, as well.

“Don’t you want the last one?”

“I ate while I was hunting.”

“Oh, good.” He sucked down most of the last fish, then let out a small, contented burp. “Oh, man, that is so much better.”

“You look better,” she informed him. “Of course, you could hardly look worse.” He smelled better as well; she assumed he had splashed about in the surf and cleaned up a bit. He was shirtless, but still had those—what were they called?—blue jeans?—on.

“Thanks for that. And for the fish. Delicious.”

“They’re just fine raw,” she muttered. “Stupid Con.”

“I love your little pet names.” He was leaning back in the sand, picking his teeth with a fish bone. “God, isn’t this great? A friggin’ island paradise with a beautiful woman who brings me food and cooks and has a great set of—never mind.”

“Are you talking about my ‘rack’ again?”

“Uh, yeah. Sorry.”

“
I
don’t mind. I am the one breaking your nudity taboo. Besides, you have a nice rack, too.” And he did. Shirtless, she could see the tanned skin, the firm muscles, the light fuzz of chest hair that tapered down to a straight line leading to his groin.

He laughed. “Oh, darlin’, you’re gonna get in trouble if you keep talking like that.”

“You mean you might like to mate with me?”

He choked on the fish bone.

I
t’s all right,” she hastily assured him after pounding him on the back and extracting the bone. “I don’t expect you to mate with me. Why would you ever want to?”

That was enough of
that
crap, he decided, and seized her by the back of the neck, yanked her close, and kissed her. She was so surprised her mouth popped open, which delighted him, and he plunged his tongue inside. Given that he hadn’t brushed his teeth in a few days (and who knew if mermaids did?) the kiss was amazing.

He eased her down on the sand and did what he had been longing to do since he’d first seen her: pounced on her breasts. The breath popped out of her lungs (gills?) as she laughed, and then gasped when he sucked a pale pink nipple into his mouth.

He lavished attention on her creamy mounds, licking, nibbling, sucking, and even (very, very gently) biting. Beneath him she wriggled in the sand and clutched his shoulders with surprising strength. In fact, he was fairly certain he’d have bruises. Not that he gave a good damn.

He slipped his hand between her cool, chubby thighs and she parted her legs and pulled him to her as he thrust into her moist warmth. Her thighs gripped him, again with that astonishing strength, and she rose to meet him. Now they were both gasping and groaning in each other’s arms, and he cut his tongue on one of her teeth and didn’t care.

“Oh—you’re—bleeding—”

“Don’t—care,” he gasped.

“Sorry—sorry—maybe we—should—stop?”

“Shut. Up.”

This time he didn’t think it was an accident when his tongue got punctured, but he had it coming so that was all right. In fact, it was so all right he laughed into her mouth, a noise which was instantly cut off as she tightened all over (
all
over) and shivered with the force of her orgasm.

That sent him right over the edge, and he knew it was going to be no use thinking about baseball or saying the alphabet backward. He came so hard he actually shuddered from heels to throat, and then unceremoniously collapsed over her.

A
fter about ten minutes had passed, Reanesta worried he had passed out, or was bleeding to death from a punctured tongue. So she tapped him on the shoulder.

“Sleepy,” he yawned against her throat.

“I am a patient woman, as I think you have noticed. But you’re squashing me.”

He snorted, but rolled off her—and yelped when he nearly rolled into the fire, which had burned down to embers. He tossed a few more sticks on, then said, “Where the hell did my jeans go?”

“Oh. I, uh, was, um, anxious to, ah, mate with you before you changed your mind.” She held up denim shreds. “I do apologize.”

“You did this with your
hands
? Jesus!”

“I apologize,” she said again, blushing.

“No, shit, it’s impressive as hell, I’m not bitching. About this, I mean.”

She giggled. “A welcome change.”

He stuck his tongue out at her. “Ith it ee’ing?”

“Not anymore.”

“We’re going to have to practice French kissing.”

“We are?” she asked, delighted.

“Shit, yeah. Otherwise it could get downright dangerous. You don’t see a blood bank on this island, do you?”

“Very well. We shall practice.”

“Starting right now,” he said, and pounced on her like a big land cat.

“Again?” she asked, delighted. “You wish to mate again?”

He sighed. “Ree, I’ve never known a woman so strong, smart, efficient, rude, and dumb at the same time.”

“Thank you?”

“Even if you weren’t gorgeous—which you
are
—you’d be a catch for any man. And I’d think that even if you hadn’t saved my ass. Multiple times,” he admitted.

“You’re so nice, Con.”

“I get off on being ‘nice,’” he said dryly. “In fact, I feel like being ‘nice’ right now.”

And he was. Extremely nice.

T
he next few days passed like a dream. A hot sex dream in which he was the star and the prettiest woman in the world was his costar. (He
had
to stop thinking in terms of movies and television.)

They bathed together, walked to the freshwater stream together, and she started to teach him to swim. She also disappeared periodically and returned with fish, which they cooked and ate.

He tried not to worry about her—in fact, given that he’d seen her in action it was stupid to worry about her—but couldn’t help it. The ocean was a big place. What if—what if a
bunch
of sharks ganged up on her? What if she ran into a bunch of merman bullies?

So he was always relieved to see her return, and she was always surprised at his relief. And she always said the same thing before she disappeared: “I will come back.”

He missed his show, but had to admit that life on a deserted island with Ree was a pretty damned nice consolation prize.

They made love as often as humanly (mermanly?) possible; he didn’t think he would ever get tired of her body. And she was indefatigable, not to mention inventive and uninhibited. He supposed a culture that swam around naked probably didn’t have a lot of hang-ups about sex.

They gorged on fish and coconuts and she occasionally brought him fistfuls of that odd, puffy seaweed. He longed for a steak, or a burger and a beer, but again, life with Ree on the island had plenty of advantages.

And one big disadvantage.

After about a week, he tackled the problem that was troubling him. “Ree, it’s not that I’m not grateful—”

“Oh, dear, more of your ‘bitching.’”

“—and it’s not that I’m not loving our time here, because I am.”

“I can tell,” she said, smiling and pointing at his groin. He’d decided nudity was the way to go as well, but had saved his boxers and T-shirt . . . for what, he wasn’t sure.

“Stop that, I’m being serious. But Ree, how long are you going to stay with me? Don’t you have a family . . . people worried about you?”

“No.”

“So you’re just going to . . . I mean, I might never get rescued.”

“Are you suggesting I just swim off and leave you?” she said, aghast.

“Well. Uh. I don’t
want
you to leave—”

“I thought you liked me.” Oh, Christ! Was that—it was! A
tear
was trickling down her left cheek.

“Ree! I do like you, I adore you, I worship you!” He pulled her into his arms and, luckily, she decided to be pulled (he had estimated that she was at least twice as strong as he was). “But this isn’t any kind of life for you. I’m just saying I don’t expect you to give up everything to stay on this little spit of sand for God knows how long.”

“I’m not leaving you,” she said, her voice muffled against his chest.

“All right, all right. Quit cryin’, will ya?” He was in a near panic. He hadn’t thought she had tear ducts! “I’m glad you want to stay, okay? It’s just . . . something that’s been on my mind for a bit, that’s all.”

So that was settled, and things went on as they had: idyllic and fun and lots of sex.

For a while.

A
bout a week later, Ree came striding out of the waves looking distracted and carrying five fish.

“Run into trouble?”

“Not . . . exactly.”

“What’s
that
mean?” he said, spitting the fish.

“I think—I think I heard someone. One of my folk.

So I—so I called him.”

“Oh.”

“Perhaps he can aid in your rescue.”

“Oh.”
He thought that over for a second. “Jeez, thanks! I guess it’s a long shot, but thanks for trying.”

“Mmmm.”

She was distracted the rest of the morning, and although he got the shock of his life when a man with vivid green hair and purple (purple!) eyes strode out of the waves, Ree only looked resigned.

“Greetings, Reanesta,” he said in a deep baritone, naked as a newt. “Were you calling me? I am Jertan.”

“Yes.” Instead of shaking hands, they sort of clasped each other’s elbows. “Thank you for coming. This is my—my friend, Con.”

“Hello, Con.” Jertan looked curious and (odd, given that he was a good three inches taller and at least thirty pounds heavier, all of it muscle) even a little wary. Con reminded himself that the Undersea Folk (for so Ree called them) were new to walking up to ordinary folks. “Are you the biped Conwin Edmund Conlinson?”

Con felt his eyebrows arch in surprise. “Yeah.” He stuck out a hand and Jertan shook it carefully. Con took his hand back, relieved none of his fingers had been crushed. “How’d you know?”

“Why, many bipeds are searching for you! They fear you have been lost forever. When I see,” he added, with a sly look at Ree, “that you are in fact doing quite well for yourself.”